Faced with the possibility of losing their jobs, three suburban Philadelphia units of The Newspaper Guild have voted to accept a final offer from Alden Capital-21st Century CMH, the company buying the bankrupt Journal Register Co.’s properties.
Albany Guild member and Times Union reporter Mark McGuire, pictured in a Guild video, is saying farewell to his job, and likely, he says, to his career in journalism. "Print journalism, here at the Times Union and everywhere else, is a different pursuit than the one I first took up in search of an easy high school English credit more than three decades ago. Obviously, the technological revolution that arrived with the Internet changed the economics and operation of the game." But he's not complaining. "It's been a thrill. It's been important. It's been fun. Most of all, it's been an honor."
In a meeting earlier this week, several members of the New York City Council accused Cablevision Corp. of engaging in "union-busting" tactics that included unfairly dismissing 22 workers, members of CWA, last month. Photo: CWA members call on the City Council to hold Cablevision accountable for labor violations.
John Sullivan, who helped lead a Philadelphia Inquirer team to a Pulitzer Prize with an examination of school violence, will join both The Washington Post and American University in May. Sullivan’s position at the Post will be underwritten by a half-million-dollar grant the Ford Foundation announced last summer it would give the Post for government-accountability reporting. Last year, with grant funds, the Post hired Mike Sallah from the Miami Herald, Kimbriell Kelly from the Chicago Reporter and Amy Brittain from the Newark Star Ledger.
East Bay Guild negotiators pressed the issue of work locations and proposed trying to find ways to reduce commute expenses during the latest round of contract talks Thursday. The Guild team also offered a partial list of high-priority bargaining points employees intend to emphasize, all of which turn on the general point of achieving parity gains relative to the San Jose Mercury News workforce.
The New Jersey State AFL-CIO is teaming up with Working Families United for New Jersey Inc. and coalition partners to debut a state-of-the-art voter registration van, making it easy to register voters where they work and live. Equipped with Internet access and computers, the van, "allows us to take our entire voter registration operation to the streets and to engage communities in the democratic process," the state fed said.
Disgusted by "vile comments" that have appeared on crime stories when suspects are African-American, the website for a collection of North Carolina newspapers is turning off the comments section for most crime articles.
The New York Guild reports that Kaplan management negotiators this week brushed aside a comprehensive union counter-proposal that addressed their “operational flexibility” concerns. Kaplan negotiators, who include three lawyers and a flown-in human resources executive, say they won't discuss dollars-and-cents issues until they get agreement on the non-economic terms -- effectively a largely unenforceable contract. The next bargaining session is set for March 12. Photo: Kaplan ESL teachers cheer their organizing victory last year.
